


i lived in (north) america for like, uh, thirteen years (that's why i'm going back, man)

by eulyhne_syios



Series: 500 Days of Summer 127 [2]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Awkward Romance, Birbs, Camping, Drama and Crack, Fluff and Humor, Great Canadian Wilderness, Johnten tryin to get a room while the rest of em start drama, Lucas getting caught up in all kinds of nature shit, M/M, NCT127 bent on bein extra in the wilderness lmaooo, Shawnyoung tryin to chill also but, also doyoung reunites with his bf shawn in canada, and gets hit by random nostalgia feels, bc love is real, bc lumark makes me soft but the biggest uwu must not be left out, bc no one wakes up that early lets be honest, burgeoning polyamory, chipmunks, early mornings where kun cooks for everyone, freaky raccoons, getting lost in hiking trails, hiking trails, lots of mosquitoes and shit, markheiwoo in da house yo, probably hints of angst bc Mark's back in Canada, tae helps out sometimes but, u feel me, usually stays in bed late bc jaeyong sorta happened lmaoo
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 18:33:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16372838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eulyhne_syios/pseuds/eulyhne_syios
Summary: And so it continues. Summer 2019, NCT127 has a North American Tour, so they decide to fly down 2 weeks early to go camping with Shawn Mendes in the Great Canadian Wilderness.orDoyoung reuniting with his boyfriend + raccoons + Lucas + trees + no wifi = NCT being crackheads in the woods





	1. Preface: day zero 2.0: 5:09 am

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo mark's canadian past is hella confusing like there's stuff saying he went to korea when he was six but then auditioned for sm in canada in 2013 so idk how that timeline works...
> 
> so im assuming he stayed in canada for around thirteen yrs for the sake of the title but y'all can correct me if u got the right info fam
> 
> update: okay, title changed for more accuracy bc I learned Mark spent a fair bit of time in NY also :)

“Okay, let's see…” Doyoung flips through one of their gym bags, making sure they’d packed everything from sunscreen to extra socks and working cans of bug spray. Tosses out Haechan’s deep sea scuba diving gear and half-broken Ouija board (ignoring Ten’s snorting). Gets a little annoyed when Mark knocks his hands away to fit in his—

 

“- _eighteen pairs of underwear_ —Mark, we’re staying there _fourteen_ days —you goddamn gonna _live_ inside the shower stall—

 

“-Hey, hey —lest y’all forget —I’m the only one who actually _lived_ in Canada, hyung —like just wait ‘til one a y’all get a ‘midnight accident’ —y’all be thanking my ass—

 

Ten snorts, texting something to Johnny who’s at the other side of the room, packing plastic utensils and mayonnaise into the cooler. The guy snorts, flips a new tab on his phone, rapidly typing, whole body trembling with laughter.

 

Mark shoots him the side-eye, stomps over and snatches his phone, squinting at the screen.

 

“The _f_ —

 

“-Already ordered a pack of twenty in bulk on Amazon Korea—

 

“- _Dammit, Johnny what the_ —

 

“- _Ayo_ , fully functional porta-potties in the Suggested bar — _lemme get thirteen of ‘em shits_ —

 

“-Hey, hey, what’s going on—

 

Mark turns, drags Haechan over to the phone screen. “-Hyuck — _for real, bro_ , this guy’s actually ordering _diapers_ online for m—

 

“-Oh, _shit_ , Markeu —you’re _pregnant—_

 

Yuta chokes on his water in the kitchen, Jungwoo’s head hits the inside of the fridge. Winwin jumps —half-peeled egg going flying, hitting Ten in the throat —who somehow manages to do a half-pirouette and smack Johnny in the left buttcheek with his tap-dancing shoe as Taeil’s fist shoots the top half of his open banana straight splat into the ceiling.

 

The phone hits the ground and cracks —frozen on _Huggies Extra Soft._

 

_“The fuck, Hyuck—_

 

“-Ayo, Mark—” Johnny pipes up, rubbing his sore ass, but still managing to get in. “-who’s the daddy —who’s the daddy—

 

Lucas bursts into the room, fists in the air. “- _I’m the daddy—!”_

 

The room falls silent. Johnny coughs, raising his eyebrows. Blinks at him twice. Yuta almost drops the second glass of water he poured for himself —other hand’s holding the phone, getting the whole thing on video.

 

“Y-you’re the father of Mark’s unborn child…?”

 

Still grinning enormously. “-I...I am—?” Pauses for a second, grin still frozen. “-w-wait a second —what’s going on—

 

Meanwhile, Kun is taking a shower in the bathroom, traditional Chinese music wafting gently from his iPad balanced on the toilet lid, encased safely in a giant Ziploc bag. He’d stayed up all night making labels for everyone’s individual toiletries (which he had to remake after Lucas ate half of them for a dare —Kun reminds himself to never use fruit-scented markers ever again…). He had no idea what was going on in the living room —he tells himself the distant screaming is from the gibbons in the background music. Ah, the sweet sounds of nature…

 

“Whoa, whoa, guys, why’re you all making so much noise in the morning…” Jaehyun yawns, Taeyong some steps behind him, tugging onto the hem of his shirt, both still clad in their pajamas. They’re the last to get out of bed and the rest of them (fully dressed) raise their brows knowingly.

 

“Oh, it’s no big deal, Jae.” Johnny shrugs. He fixed his screen and began adding porta-potties to his shopping cart. Squeezes in two packs of _Pampers_ baby wipes —free shipping with orders over $500. “-you guys can go back to sleep.”

 

“Yeah, no big deal.” Haechan nods. “-I mean, Mark’s only five months pregnant but hey, Rolling Stones did say newborn babies just happen on the regular, huh?”

 

“Uh huh…” Jaehyun nods, rubbing his eyes, yawning again. “-nngh, apparently Canada has free healthcare, how ‘bout we do the ultrasound in Ontario…”

 

The rest of them stare at the two of them, speechless. A tiny crash sounds in the kitchen as Yuta drops his glass. Mark’s begrudgingly turned his attention back to packing, yapping at Lucas to help him stuff in some extra socks.

 

“Ugh, sweet gentle Jesus…” Taeyong muttered, smushing his head against Jae’s back, trying to get some more sleep. “-I thought Jungwoo was the last member of 127 and now Mark’s having a baby…”

 

As Tae dozes off again, he wonders _Do they give you insurance for child support in Canada...?_

 

**...**

 

**day one 4:43 pm**

 

About another century later, all thirteen of them are crammed inside a rented van on the way to Killarney Provincial Park, passing by fields upon fields of open countryside. Kun doesn’t think he’s ever seen a sky so blue —the pollution in Beijing wasn’t exactly getting much better, and this enjoyment is only mildly diminished by what sounds like a family of stoned hornets humming into his right ear.

 

That family of hornets turns out to be just Lucas attempting to meditate with both wrists pressed tightly over the front of his crotch, rocking his body back and forth with visibly strained motion. Jungwoo patiently instructs him on how to control his breathing while everyone else tries to pretend he isn’t there.

 

Kun rolls his eyes, sighing.

 

“Lu...Lucas what are you doing…”

 

“ _I neeeeeed to peeeeeeeeeeeee…_ ” Came the monotone, oddly almost sedating reply.

 

“Hey, Johnny!” The other calls to the one driving. “-uh, Lucas—

 

“ _-neeeeeeeeeeds to peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee…_ ”

 

“Nah, sorry no can do, buddy.” Came the reply back. “-next gas station’s not for another 49 kilometers…”

 

Elbows Mark in the gut when he snorts _long ass ride_. Regains his composure and goes back to meditating.

 

Less than four minutes later, Lucas snaps out of his trance, starts panickedly slapping the back head of Johnny’s car seat.

 

“Yo, yo, yo man, you gotta let me out — _I can’t hold it anymore, man_ —

 

“-Lucas, bro, I’m driving at _57 kilometers an hour_ —are you _trying_ to get yourself _k_ —

 

“- _Johnnyyyyy,_   _I need to peeeeeeeee_ —

 

“-You can’t _pee on the road_ —

 

“- _I’ll pee in the sky_ —

 

“- _Gravity’s_ a thing—

 

“- _I’ll pee on a rock_ —

 

“There’s _no frickin’ rocks_ here, bro—

 

“- _I’ll pee in a cornfield_ —

 

“You can’t _pee_ in a _cornfield,_ you dumbass _…_!” Ten snapped, taking over for Johnny.

 

“- _Why not_ —

 

“-Because it’s _illegal_ —

 

“- _Birds pee in cornfields all the goddamn time, man_ —you don’t see _them_ goin’ to jail—

 

“- _Are you a bird, Lucas_ —?”

 

“- _Yes, I am_ —

 

“- _No, you’re not_ —

 

“- _I believe I can fly_ —

 

“- _Wh_ —

 

“- _I believe I can touch the sky.”_ Keeps going when no one stops him. _“-I think about it every night and day.”_

 

Jaehyun snorts, going in to harmonize. “- _spread my wings and fly away.”_

 

_“I believe I can soar…”_

 

 _“I see me running through that open_ — _LUCAS WHAT THE F_ —

 

But the guy’s flung open the door already and leapt out of the van, rolling furiously into the nearest cornfield.

 

Johnny slams the brakes and everyone whams into the back of their seat, groaning. It takes another few moments for them all to collect themselves and then Winwin sighs.

 

“Alright, what do we do now…?”

 

“He wanted to pee in a cornfield, let him pee in the goddamn cornfield, the hell can we do about it…” Ten muttered, picking at the loose threads on his jean holes.

 

“Sure hope he knows what he’s doing…” Johnny sighed.

 

“He rolled out of a fucking van going 50 kilometers per hour.”

 

“-He’s not dead, though.” Doyoung turned to him, but nodded reluctantly. Guy was made for action movies. If he ever got kicked out of NCT at least he could replace Tom Cruise after the guy busted a kneecap or something.

 

“You know, maybe we really should’ve invested in some porta-potties—

 

“- _Johnny.”_

 

**...**

 

**6:38 pm**

 

“Okay, what the fuck.”

 

Almost over two hours had passed and Lucas was somehow still nowhere to be found. Doyoung wondered if maybe the guy found a portal to another dimension underneath some cornstalk and was now enjoying his best life as a Zumba instructor at a Brazilian dance class in some beach with lots of monkeys and seashells.

 

“You think maybe Lucas decided to quit NCT and become a pumpkin farmer.”

 

“Doyoung, what in God’s name—

 

“-He’s been peeing for _almost two hours_..." He reminded Taeyong. "-a normal human being would've lost all their bodily fluids by now and be blowing around in the wind with their goddamn plastic bag looking ass…”

 

“-You can’t possibly  _pee_ for more than two hours—

 

“-Well, then, the  _hell's_ going on—

 

“-Can you get high on corn, lads.”

 

All ten of them turn to Ten, wordless. Johnny actually turned completely around in his seat. Haechan was the only one who didn’t seem too surprised by the idea.

 

“-Look, I’m just saying.” Ten rolled his eyes. “-we don’t know shit about corn —what if unripe corn has like, I dunno —hallucinogens or some shit so now Lucas is prancing around in the cornfield chasing sugar plum fairies and whatnot.”

 

Doyoung smushed his face into his hands, groaning.

 

“This can’t be happening. This can’t be fucking happening.”

 

“Y-you want me to call Shawn about—

 

“-Mark, last time I checked, national parks don’t have _cell phone reception_ …”

 

“-Well, hey, hey, maybe he’s not there yet...”

 

“Fat chance.” Then he sighs, shaking his head. “-whatever, go ahead. Go call him before I lose my friggin’ mind…” _Goddamn just wanted to reunite with my boyfriend in the great outdoors and now one eighteenth of NCT is lost in a fucking cornfield_ — _what version of Bohemian Rhapsody am I trapped inside right now…?_

 

Mark nudges Johnny for Shawn’s number, dials it up a moment later. Hesitantly reaches the phone over to Doyoung, asking:

 

“Hey, hyung, you wanna talk to him about…?”

 

“Are you _s_ —I literally _cannot_ English right now —I can barely-

 

He sucks back the stress tears and looks him dead in the eye.

 

“—Mark, if I talk to him right now I’m just gonna say _Lucas_ and _cornfield_ and start crying —Shawn’s gonna think I’m having a stroke, which honestly might not be too far away from what I’m _currently_ experiencing—

 

“-Okay, okay, hyung —don’t worry, don’t worry, I gotchu, I gotchu.” Mark put the phone back to his ear. “-hey, Shawn?”

 

“ _Hi, who’s speaking?”_

 

“Yo, it’s Mark from NCT. We met up last year in LA, remember?”

 

_“Oh…! Oh, hey! How are you? How’re things going with all you guys?”_

 

“Oh, it’s just great. Things are great —c-couldn’t be better…”

 

“ _Glad to hear that. Hey, how’s Doyoung doing, can I talk to him?”_

 

“U-uh, well, actually, um…” He looks over at him, the other guy making the knife gesture at his throat. “-uh, actually Doyoung’s on the toilet right now, he, he can’t come to the phone unfortunately…”

 

“ _Oh, okay, okay, sorry_ — _that was dumb of me. Anyways, so you’re just calling to say hi?”_

 

“Uh, well, actually, um, we’re on the road right now and we, uh…” Mark falters, still eyeing the empty cornfield. “-um, we’re having some issues, um, with the, uh…”

 

“ _Shit, you guys ran out of gas?”_

 

“Uh, no, no, nothing like that, um…” He ran a hand through his hair. “-look, uh, one of our guys, sorta got lost, um…”

 

_“Got lost? Seriously? Woah, dude, how?”_

 

“Uh, um, in, in a gas station…?

 

 _“Wow…”_ He kinda cringes at the uneasy laughter on the other end. _“-and how big is this gas station, eh?”_

 

“ _Just tell him the truth…”_ Johnny and Jaehyun mutter at the same time. Johnny looks over, eye widened, the other just smiling —it was another one of those times where they unknowingly said the same thing.

 

“O-okay, Shawn, so this _might_ sound kinda crazy…”

 

_“Okay, yeah? What’s going on?”_

 

“S-so, uh, Lucas had to go to the bathroom and there weren’t any around so he...uh…”

 

_“Yeah?”_

 

“K-kinda jumped out the van and rolled into a cornfield…”

 

“ _To pee?”_

 

“Uh, yup…” He looks down, smoothing a jean leg. “-and so now he’s kinda…”

 

“ _Lost in a cornfield…?”_

 

“Yeah…” He nodded. “-yeah, now he’s lost in a cornfield…”

 

_“Shit.”_

 

“Yeah, man, you’ve got no idea…” He laughs, half-heartedly. “-anyways, um, so, uh, we’ll probably be running a bit late so just sit tight and, uh—

 

 _“-No, no, no_ — _hey, you know what_ — _just stay there, I’ll come find you guys and we’ll look for him together_ —

 

“-Hey, Shawn, it’s okay, you don’t gotta trouble yourself that much—

 

 _“No, Mark, seriously_ — _I asked you guys to come over to Canada and now one of you’s lost_ — _it’s basically my fault-_

 

“Hey-

 

“— _it’s not a problem, okay_ — _I’ll just track your call on GPS and be there in half an hour or so.”_

 

“-Y-you sure, man? I mean, you really don’t have to…”

 

 _“I’m already on my way, don’t worry about it. Like Johnny said_ — _just a bro helping another bro out.”_

 

“-Wow, thanks, man, seriously." He nods, a bit more relieved than before. "-really appreciate it…”

 

 _“Not a problem_ — _I’ll see you guys soon, eh?”_

 

“Yeah, yeah see you soon. Alright, thanks Shawn.” Hangs up, shoves the phone back in his pocket.

 

Doyoung looks at him, waiting. “-okay, so, what exactly—

 

“-Your boyfriend’s coming over to help us look for Lucas.”

 

“-wait, _what_ —

 

“-Come on, be happy —he’s literally driving his ass over to _see_ you…”

 

“...”

 

“Doyoung-hyung?”

 

The other just plants his face into the windshield, muttering barely audibly. “- _friggin’ family’s a fucking nightmare…”_

 

An even more barely audible reply sounds back from Winwin who just quietly squeezes his knee in reassurance. _I know, hyung. I know._

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this was a whole lot funnier when i was in the shower last month but we gotta start somewhere guys 
> 
> also schoolwork is wack rn, updates will be hella irregular ;)
> 
> (im lowkey done with myself but if nct ain't gonna let 'regular, huh' die im making as many regular jokes as i can whilst im still breathing on this earth, u feel)


	2. day one: 7:21 pm

“Okay, so, how long was he gone again?”

 

The two of them are some meters inside the towering cornstalks, wincing occasionally when the leaves scrape by their shins and shoulders. Doyoung sighs, shaking his head. You couldn’t see shit in here. What, with the daylight starting to fade away too, Lucas could be right behind them and they’d never know.

 

“Like maybe two hours?” He guessed. “-three now, probably.”

 

“Crap, and how fast does he walk?” Swatting a band of wasps starting to circle his sweaty head. The other peels open half-melted Kitkat bar, waving it over Shawn’s hair, then tosses it far out, watching the buzz chase after it.

 

“He didn’t _walk_.” Doyoung exhaled. “-he jumps out the van — _rolling_ into cornfield.”

 

Shawn snorts.

 

“ _Rolling_.”

 

“Who knows?” A tiny smile at one end of his mouth. “-maybe still rolling now.”

 

The other blows a raspberry, hand over his mouth. They exchange humoured glances and continue on. Doyoung turns and then notices the odd shape of Shawn’s backpack.

 

“Um, why did you bring…?” Gesturing to the guitar case, brow raised.

 

Shawn winks. “-I got an idea.” Motions for them to keep going a bit further. “-let’s find a good place to sit down.”

 

They find a decently dry patch of ground and Doyoung joins him as the other gets out his guitar.

 

“Okay, so sound travels right?” Shawn turns to him. “-I mean, even with all this corn and stuff he should be able to hear it and try to get closer, ‘cause he’s curious where it’s coming from.”

 

“Sure, I guess.” He shrugs. “-how you going to make sure he comes?”

 

“I’ve got the perfect thing.” He grins. “-I practiced for like, two months after I flew back to Toronto, be proud of me, okay?”

 

“O-okay…?”

 

He doesn’t recognize it at first —probably ‘cause it’s hard to replicate the bass on an acoustic guitar, but when Shawn comes in with his (sort of still wonky) Korean, Doyoung’s face lights up in surprise.

 

_“Leggo wooorld i gonggan soge bimil (shimmy shimmy) —gaaakkaumeun gamyeon gateun gimmick (gimme gimme). Urin manjil su eopneun geol midji—_

 

Doyoung joins in.

 

_“Woo neodo alji —urin algo itji woo—_

 

“-I got Jaehyun’s part—

 

“-‘Kay—

 

“- _deo gakkawojin geon —soriboda deo keun byeok—_

 

When they get to the chorus, Shawn strums much louder, nudging him. “-yo, yo, we gotta _yell_ —

 

“ _NAEGA NEOL IKKEUNEUN BOSS—_

 

_“DON’T YOU KNOW IMMA—_

 

_“NAEGA NEOL UMJIGIN PLAYAAAAAAA—_

 

_“DON’T YOU KNOW IMMA— YO, HOW WE KNOW THIS GONNA WORK—_

 

_“-HE’S GOTTA COME IN WHEN HIS RAP PART DROPS —IT’S PURE SCIENCE—_

 

**7:47 pm** _  
_

 

“Yo, hand me the spicy noodle flavour packet.”

 

“Uh, okay, hyung…” Jaehyun tossed the bag over uneasily. “-you really sure this is gonna work?”

 

“All I gotta do is get this stove started, throw in some stuff I made last night —Jae, pass me that turkey sausage—

 

“-What part—

 

“-Left pocket, third zipper down the front—

 

“-There’s still _ice_ inside it…”

 

They were about a few dozen meters into the cornfield, northwest of Doyoung and Shawn, Taeyong hovering over the propane stove, trying to get it to turn on while Jaehyun continued to dig around in the backpack _. Okay, so smell travels, right? —Yeah, sure, hyung. —So all we gotta do is cook some good eatin’ and Lucas'll come running over —he’s gotta be starving by now._

 

“I dunno, Taeyong...” Hands on his hips, shaking his head. “-I mean, what if Lucas got so far he's not even _in_ this cornfield anymore?”

 

“Don't be ridiculous…” Claps with a small shout when the blue flame finally flares up, sprinkling in the spice packet when the water finally boils. “-there’s a bigger chance he's passed out on the ground from eating a pound of raw corn than making his way to the nearest Burger King, which is what…”

 

“Like about 33 kilometers from here?” Jaehyun tosses in some Napa cabbage, shredded carrots and onions, diced tofu. Almost breaks a fingernail from picking out the ice around the sausages. Tosses a few in.

 

“ _Wh—_ Jae, you did _not_ just throw in three full wieners without cutting th _—_

 

“-We didn't bring a _proper_ knife in the b _—_

 

“-Doyoung's brow scissors in the upper right pocket first zipper _—_

 

“-Do you actually care _more_ about the _food_ than _finding Lucas—_

 

Taeyong exhaled, rolling his eyes, stilling stirring the soup.

 

“-Jae, I _care_ about Lucas _—I care about Lucas —_ that’s why we're cooking food to _lure him_ _back to NCT—_

 

“-If he's _passed out on the ground from eating raw corn,_ hyung, how the heck is he gonna _smell our food—_

 

“-What do you wanna do then, Jae?” He scoffed, hoisting up the heavy pot and almost getting boiling soup over both of them. “-you wanna take turns carrying this thing and go in an ever shrinking circle inside this corn-filled nightmare, hoping we'll run into Lucas _that_ way _—_

 

“-Taeyong-hyung, look _—_ you gotta sit down and eat something _—_ you’re not making any sense _—_

 

“-Don't _touch_ me, Jae _—_ I’m _holding_ soup! Look _—my 7th sense is telling me Lucas is coming—_

 

“-Hyung _—we only have_ _five senses_   _—_ you’re malfunctioning again, you need to _eat—_

 

“-Don’t tell your _hyung_ what to do _—_ ” He sets the pot back down, digs his pocket for a spoon. Tastes it, shakes his head. “-needs more heat... Jae _—_ the cayenne's in the third pocket after Doyoung's brow scissors _—_

 

“-God, why didn't we tell Lucas _to charge his damn phone before leaving…”_

 

**8:27 pm**

 

“Yo, yo Zeus-hyung _—_ gimme a boost!”

 

“Haechanie, one second _—_

 

“-I really, _really_ don’t think this is a good idea…”  

 

They'd tried to divide it so each search party had at least one English speaker (excluding Kun and Jungwoo waiting in the car, just in case Lucas magically found his way back) _—_ Shawn and Doyoung, Jaehyun and Taeyong, Johnny and Ten. Mark tried telling Haechan his English was good enough to accompany Taeil ( _Plus Taeil-hyung's English isn’t even that bad either..._ ) but neither Taeil nor Yuta wanted to be separated from Winwin so that left the five of them together.

 

“You know, actually, I agree with Sichengie _—_ I don’t think it’s ethical _—_

 

Haechan rolled his eyes, staring at the three of them with exasperation (Mark was a bit apart from them, drawing some weird ass lines in the ground like _that_ would help locate Lucas in this FarmVille lookin' shit…)

 

“Winwin _—_ it’s not fair _—_ you can’t always _antagonize_ my ideas _—you know_ Yuta and Taeil will listen to whatever you say _—_

 

“I’m _not_ the antagonist _—_ what you’re doing is wrong _—someone could get hurt—_

 

“-They’re just wimpy little _corn cobs…_ ”

 

“-They _look_ like _missiles_ …!”

 

“ _So—_?”

 

_So, if you hit a stray farmer —they’ll probably frame us for terrorism_ was something Lucas would probably say, Winwin thought. Didn’t he read somewhere that in order to track the person, you gotta think like the person? Was Lucas getting any closer now?

 

“-I don’t even _throw_ that hard…” Hyuck scoffed. “-plus, none of _you_ guys got any better ideas…!”

 

“-We could just shout his name over and over _—_

 

“-And risk damaging our vocal cords _—thus, ending our careers—_   _Hell_ -to-the- _fucking_ no.” Started grabbing as many corn cobs from the ground as he could carry. “-okay, _somebody_ gimme a boost so I can throw a bunch of these in, like, 9 different directions and _h—_

 

“-How do you even _know,_ you’ll _hit_   _Lucas—_

 

“I _don’t —_ but like some  _wise_ men once said _—Don’t Stop— Believin'—_

 

“-Okay, okay, okay, Haechanie, gimme a second.”

 

Yuta went over to the side, both hands on Winwin’s shoulders (Taeil keeping a close eye on him to make sure he wasn’t doing anything suspicious like “accidental” booty grabbing).

 

“Winwin.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“I need to know.” He looked over at Haechan, then turning to face him again. “-if I side with Haechan this one time…”

 

“Yeah…?”

 

“...will…”

 

“Yeah…?”

 

“...w-will you still…”

 

“Yeah.”

 

His voice suddenly got very small.

 

“...will you still love me?”

 

“Wait, _what—_

 

“-I’m _serious_ _—_ I _care about your opinion because I lo—_

 

“-Go hurry up and _give Haechan a boost_ —sleeping in this creepy cornfield scares me…”

 

“-Okay!”

 

A moment later, Haechan’s (mostly) balanced atop Yuta’s shoulders, with about a dozen fallen corn cobs in his arms, ordering the guy to spin him around to Michael Jackson’s _Beat It_ (that _he_ would sing acapella, obviously) and stop at random times so he could hurl some corns in the designated direction.

 

Five corns in, all he heard was just one disappointing thud after the other. Mark has stopped with his attempted Cubism at this point and stares at Haechan and Yuta in disbelief. Taeil and Winwin decided to just sit down and braid the ends of the leftover corn cobs, occasionally looking up to check their progress.

 

Mark rolled his eyes.

 

“-Okay, this is, like, the _stupidest_ thing I’ve ever s _—_

 

_“_ _Aghhhhfffpppp_ _—_!”

 

“-What in the world _—_

 

“- _Frickin’ told you idiots—_!” Haechan shrieked, sliding down Yuta like a firepole and racing in the direction of the pained whimper. “- _I got him, I got him —I caught Lucas with my mad ninja skills, boiiiiii—_

 

The rest of them chase after him, smacking at the annoying-ass corn leaves flapping and slapping them in the face every time they took another leap. Winwin trailed behind, muttering. _Maybe I’m getting tired, but that sure didn’t sound like Lucas at all…_

 

The last thing Ten felt before his face hit the ground was a blunt object (some dude’s pickaxe…?) knocking the wind out of him from the back. He feels a dull, blooming pain in his lower left kidney, and he rubs the spot, wincing.  _S_ _wear to God, when we find Lucas, gonna whoop his ass into another timezone…_

 

Johnny leaned over him, loosely shaking his shoulder.

 

“Hey.” Shook his shoulder a little harder. Flicked him (lightly) in the head. “-hey, babe —you okay?”

 

“Am I okay…” He muttered sarcastically, getting up from his elbows. “-am I okay —how can I be _okay_ —goddamn _serial killer’s_ on the loose in this cornfield _tryna hot diggity dang nuke my ass—_

 

“-Lucas—?!”

 

Haechan couldn’t believe his eyes —Lucas had gotten hit so hard by the cob his soul had flown out and went inside Ten’s body. By God, maybe he really was stronger than he—

 

“Okay, look, Haechan.” Johnny then bursts his bubble. “-I get that you and Ten don’t always get along for whatever reason, but like —that does _not_ give you the right to just _knock out my boyfriend—_

 

“-Ugh, Johnny, don’t be dumb — _I was trying to hit Lucas—_

 

Ten jerked his head, eyes wide.

 

“You were trying to _hit L_ —this cornfield’s like the size of, like, _eighteen_   _hundred_ fucking football fields —you’ll hit the _ghost of George W. Bush_ before you hit _Lu—_

 

“-Everybody _shut up —I got an idea—_!”

 

They all turned to Mark who’d not said a single word until now. He cleared his throat and picked out some corn strings from his hair, dusted off his pants.

 

“Okay, first of all, Bush is actually still alive—

 

“-Which only _further_ proves my point—

 

“- _Second_ —” He holds out a hand to signal he wasn’t done yet. “-I know how to get Lucas back.”

 

Johnny snorted. So did Ten. And Haechan. And Yuta and Winwin and Taeil who’d gone off to the side to play Hot Potato with some fallen corn cobs.

 

“Okay — _what_?”

 

“...lowkey sounds like _he dumped you—_

 

“- _Anyways_ —so he and I kinda have a secret signal thing sort of, that we, like, uh, use...from time to time…”

 

“Alright, yeah, cute.” Johnny nodded. “-go on.”

 

“Can, can, uh, y’all, like, plug your ears…?” Mark looked to the side, flattening his mouth. “-it’s kinda embarrassing…”

 

“Yeah, yeah, no problem.” Came a flurry of answers as the rest of them proceeded to pretend to plug their ears. Mark nods and clears throat again, takes a deep breath.

 

“ _BABYYY_ _손_ _—!_ ” He gulps, hands around his mouth, shouting. “- _BABYYYYYYY_ _손_ _——————!”_ Rolls his eyes, tries again. “- _BABYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY_ _손_ _—————————!”_

 

Haechan just stares at him, utterly flabbergasted.

 

“The _f—”_ He scoffs. “-you go around calling _my_ idea _stupid_ and then you come up with _th—_

 

“ _Shush it, Hyuck —LISTEN_ _——————_ _!”_

 

At first he hears nothing. Then he concentrates harder.

 

From a distance, muffled down by the swishing of the corn leaves he hears a far-off yell of what sounds like the same thing.

 

“What next level mating call…” Yuta narrows his eyes (lowkey jealous ‘cause it sounded way cooler than the one he and Haechan did in that one BoB dance practice). “-you know, it kinda sounds like—

 

“- _Shush it, man —We found Lucas for real this time—_

 

And with that Mark takes off towards the distant cry of _BABY_ _손_ _—_ the rest of them scrambling after him (most of them running with their forearms in front of their faces to avoid getting scraped by the leaves and lowkey looking like a band of Power Rangers about to transform)

 

**8:59 pm**

 

“Yo, you hear that?”

 

Jaehyun turns his head to the direction of the noise and waves it off. “-nah, hyung it’s probably just the w—

 

“- _Shhht_ —Jae, _I’m telling you —that’s_ the sound of _Lucas—_

 

Taeyong had seen that vlive where Lucas was clowning Mark’s tiny ass hands on YouTube (Johnny sent it to him, like last week or something) —this _had_ to be it, this _had to b—_

 

“-It, it just sounds like someone screaming ‘rabies’ in the distance…” The sky was now the colour of fermenting beans, making the cornstalks take on a rather serpentine-like appearance. “-Tae-hyung, maybe we should start heading back—

 

“- _Shhh_ —we gotta let him _know_ we hear him!” Taeyong took a deep breath and hollered at the top of his lungs. “- _BABYYY_ _손_ _—!_ ” Sucks in more air and screams another one. “- _BABYYYYYYY_ _손_ _——————!”_

 

“Tae, what if—

 

But he was already packing up the leftover vegetable tofu soup and folding up the portable stove, and with a couple clangs into Jae’s backpack, disappears swiftly into the thick brush. Jaehyun sighs, flicking on a flashlight, hurrying after him.

 

**9:16 pm**

 

“Nn, what’s that sound…”

 

“Uhh, no idea…”

 

After having given up trying to win back Lucas with BOSS, Doyoung and Shawn had called out his name a number of times, wandering further into the cornfield until they reached a large, circular clearing. Doyoung remembered something he read on Wikipedia (sometimes when he couldn’t sleep he read up on random cool phenomena online —just one of his nerdy high school habits he never grew out of) and nudged Shawn — _Crop circle —they use these for attract aliens and UFO stuff._

 

Shawn had grinned, pulling the other closer in to his side, planting a muffled kiss into his hair. _Too_ _smart. Ugh, I’m so glad you’re here again._

 

Anyways, with the sun going down and them being a bit too far from the cars parked at the edge of the cornfield, they decided to build a miniature tent out of cornstalks and had taken out the extra sleeping bags Shawn had packed in his second bag. It smelled too much like stale corn and damp hay but at least they were together. Lying on his stomach, elbows propping himself up, Doyoung picks out stray strings and debris that have fallen into Shawn’s hair, wondering how exactly they were gonna find their way outta here tomorrow.

 

“Shh, Doyoung, listen.” Shawn points with his nose, looking behind them. “-I think I hear, like, voices in the distance or something…”

 

He squeezes his eyes closed and listens harder, sure enough there’s some kind of funny caveman screeching going on. It was probably nothing. Plus, he was totally swamped from three hours of sitting in the car and then another three looking for Lucas in the damn cornfield. He needed to sleep.

 

“I think it’s nothing.” Doyoung muttered, lying back down. “-probably birds, something.”

 

“O-okay…” Shawn agreed, still not entirely convinced. _Sounded like it was getting closer too._ “-whatever you say, baby...”

 

“Don’t worry, be happy.” He pinches the other lightly on the nose, making him laugh.

 

Shawn sighed, just appreciating the moment. He had the most adorable boyfriend ever.

 

**9:38 pm**

 

Lucas stumbles out of the cornfield, hair clinging to his forehead, giant sweat stain over the back of his shirt. It’s really dark now and he’s grateful whoever's in the vehicle parked ahead kept their headlights on. He hadn’t gone too far into the cornfield after he, uh, _rolled_ in, and he had to go so bad he’d just stood up and emptied his bladder under the first cornstalk he’d seen. Then he was about to head back to the van when he saw something shining, flickering in the distance _—_ some upside down reflection of the barn some kilometers up ahead and he had to, he just _had_ to find out what it was.

 

So he went deeper into the cornfield and before he knew it, this upside down barn thing disappeared and he looked to his left and saw upside down floating trees, then started chasing those. Then after those disappeared, he saw upside down cars rolling around in some invisible highway in the sky and he went after those too until he got too tired and had to sit down and take a rest.

 

Had picked a corn, peeled it, and taken a bite, spitting it out after the acid stung his mouth. Tossed it away. Took a little nap afterwards, had a dream he finally got inside the upside down barn and finally realized it was a dream when Lee Soo-man put a garland of Hawaiian flowers over him as well as a medal and crowned him the newest member of NCT Dream. Oh, well. It was okay to dream sometimes.

 

Anyways, things started getting a little scary after he woke up and saw the sky had gotten a whole lot darker and when he’d jumped up a few times to get some idea of where he was, almost got hit by a stray flying corn that seemed to have burst out of the ground some meters away. More corns began shooting by one after the other and Lucas convinced himself he had to get out of here before some angry corn poltergeist snatched his ass for real.

 

It had taken about a dozen wrong turns but he’d finally found the cornstalk he peed under —he’d tied a red _NCT Firetruck_ rubber bracelet to one of the leaves to mark the spot and soon enough (which was fortunate because the sun had long gone down by now) Lucas got out, following the glow of the vehicle headlights bleeding into the gaps of the cornstalks ahead of him.

 

Jogging over to the van, he makes his way to the driver’s windshield.

 

Kun jolts awake to a giant hooded figure yodeling _Geokjinhajimaaaa_ at the window, anxiously smacking the glass with both arms. For a second he’d thought it was a grizzly bear or some shit, had a two-second nightmare that NCT’s music had traveled so far, wild animals were starting to learn it too —it was just a matter of time before entire ecosystems showed up at his door orchestrating whole performance versions of _Black on Black._

 

Anyhow, Kun got out his flashlight and found out, thank God, it was just Lucas and rolls down the window, relieved, if not a little bit exasperated.

 

“Lucas, what _happened_ to you…?” He demanded in Mandarin.

 

“Kun-ge, _oh my God_ —you would _not_ believe what happened —I went to pee and then I saw some _floating upside down farmhouse thingy_ in the distance —I was chasing it and then I saw _upside down trees_ and then _cars_ and then I got tired and then I…”

 

The other sighed, shaking his head. _Of course_ Lucas would be the one getting spirited away by late summer Fata Morgana mirages. Of course.

 

But at least he was safe here now —didn’t appear to be hurt at all —what, with the flurry of speech flapping out of his mouth, and all those crazy, sweeping hand gestures. Anyhow, he _did_ manage to get back here after being lost for hours, so at least that was kinda impressive.

 

Kun unlocks the door and Lucas sidles up next to Jungwoo, shaken awake now, whole face lighting up when he sees him again.

 

“Lucas! Lucas —you come back, I’m so happy!” He gushes in English, giving him a tight hug, not even the slightest bit mad.  

 

“Aw, hyung, you smell like snacks,” Lucas hugs him back, chuckling, feeling a lot better now. “-do we have food —I’m _soooo_ hungry…”

 

“Yes, yes, we have food —Kun-ge, go get him some of those Chinese and Japanese snacks Yuta and Winwin bought for the trip —it’s in the fourth pocket, second zipper.”

 

After Lucas devoured (basically) all the snacks, Kun turns over.

 

“Hey, so Lucas —did you see anyone else in the cornfield?”

 

“Anyone else? What do you mean?”

 

Kun mentally smacked himself in the face.

 

“Oh, my God, Lucas —the _rest of NCT_ went into the cornfield like _three hours ago —looking for you—_

 

“-Wait, woah, so _everybody_ else is still _inside—_

 

“-Oh, my God, oh my God…” The smile on Jungwoo’s face melted off, hands over his face. “-Kun, hyung, hyung, what’re we gonna do —what’re we gonna do, we can’t even call 911 —we’re in the _middle of nowhere—_

 

“-No, no no, Jungwoo, Jungwoo —calm down, calm down, okay?” Kun turned to Lucas again. “-okay, are you _sure_ you didn’t see _anyone_ else inside the cornfield?”

 

“Okay, well…” Lucas thought for a moment. “-like I dunno if this is useful, hyung but, like, at some point, I saw flying corn cobs—

 

“Lucas, I’m _serious—_

 

“No, no, Kun, listen —they were flying like somebody was th—

 

“- _throwing_ them —okay, okay, I got it.” He nods, steadying his breathing. Chances were, the guys were still in _this_ cornfield at least and probably weren’t _too_ far away. “-Lucas, was there any place in the cornfield you remember really well that you think the other guys might stop at to rest or something?”

 

Lucas paused, raising a finger, then his eyes lit up and he nodded eagerly, hands shaking in anticipation.

 

“ _Yeah, yeah, yeah_ —there was this big open space somewhere in the middle of the cornfield —it’s basically a huge circle —even if you just go straight, you’ll find it for sure—

 

“-And you think they’re all over there, probably?”

 

“Yeah, yeah —that’s what I think, I mean, the rest of the place is just corn and corn and corn, so—

 

“-Alright, guys.” Kun turns the key into ignition. He hadn’t appeared in a single NCT music video thus far, and thinks, yeah, driving straight into a cornfield is probably illegal but when’s he gonna get another opportunity to be _this_ badass? He looks over at the others and nods. “-brace yourselves —we’re going in.”

 

With that, they charge in van-first, Kun's hair flying majestically as Lucas and Jungwoo cheer in the back.

 

“ _Woohoooooooo_ — _NCT in da hoooooouuuuuuusssssssssseee, maaaaaaaannnnn—!_ ”

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ayo but mark screaming baby 손 in a cornfield is my aesthetic 
> 
> also dw kun saves them all in the next chap and they finally make it to the national park :)
> 
> (okay but when kun woke up i lowkey imagined the whole cornfield dancing to black on black and died for like 5 mins --it's like that vine where someone put on BoB to two earthworms fighting lmaoooo)


	3. day one: 10:18 pm

 

“Crap, crap —Doyoung, somebody’s coming — _we gotta p—_

 

“-haven’t seen you in _almost_ year —Shawn, seriou—

 

Sudden rustling in the leaves behind them made Doyoung jump (making Shawn wince...), and he huffed as he dragged himself off the other guy’s lap, yanking up his jeans after he rolled back onto his own sleeping bag. Rolls his eyes as Shawn readjusts his sweats. Couldn’t have, like, one damn second of privacy in this b—

 

Hands suddenly beat around the roof of their cornstalk tent, Doyoung curled in fetal position, fuming. Shawn froze in place, scared as hell, like it was some Freddie Kruger level shit.

 

“Lucas?! Lucas?! Yo, Lucas!”

 

“The f—” Doyoung grit in Korean. “-the fuck’s _Mark_ doing h—

 

Whole roof gets ripped off right then and Mark blindly grasps for what he thinks is a head, snatches the hand back when—

 

“Flippin’ _shit_ , Lucas —did you just _bite_ m—

 

“-it’s _not_ Lucas —it’s _Doyoung,_ you _dumbass_ —

 

“Wh— _Doyoung—?”_

 

“-A-and Shawn…too...” The other added, still kinda scared. “-it, it’s just us, Mark —Lucas never, uh, c—

 

“ _BABYYYYYY_ _손_ _———_ _!”_

 

Mark jerks his head to the shriek (at least that’s what Doyoung thinks he does —he can’t see shit right now) and screams back the reply and Doyoung sighs in relief as his voice gets smaller and smaller as he runs off towards the other invisible screaming entity in the distance.

 

“ _BABYYYYY_ _손_ _———_ _!”_

 

“ _BABYYY_ _손_ _—_ _!”_

 

“ _BABYYYYYYYY_ _손_ _———------_ _!”_

 

“ _BABYYYY_ _손_ _——_ _!”_

 

“ _BABY_ _소_ _—_

 

They crash headfirst (most likely, Doyoung heard a booming thud in the distance) and tumble over each other onto the dried grass. Neither of them can see shit so they just start blindly smoothing their hands around trying to determine if the other was Lucas.

 

When Mark feels the stiff, overdyed hair, he knows.

 

When Taeyong feels those tiny, tiny ass hands, he knows.

 

“Mark/Taeyong?!” They both blurted out at the same time. “-wait, then where’s _L—_

 

“Aw, what the _heck_ , Mark…!” Johnny whined, running over. “- _now_ how the hell are we gonna find _Lucas—_

 

“What’d I frickin’ sa— _pppppffff_ —” Haechan crashes into Johnny’s back. “-we should’ve just all started hurling corns all over the place — _we were bound to hit Lucas at some poi_ —

 

“-Haechan, the _minute_ Lucas rolled his stupid ass into this farmer jungle, we were already fucked.” Ten scoffed, dusting the hay off of Taeyong’s pants. “-now we’re just even _more_ fucked —it’s pitch black, _no_ cellphone reception, _no_ food ‘cause we’re not cattle, _no_ guaranteed safety from being eaten by whatever the fuck comes out at night — _we don’t even know where we goddamn are—_

 

“-Hey, guys —look over there!” Jaehyun pointed his flashlight in the direction of a messy golden bump at the edge of the crop circle they were in, recognizing Doyoung and Shawn in the midst of it all.

 

He chuckled. Even in the distance, he could tell the guy was flipping them the bird.

 

“Oh, how cute —they made themselves a little corn house.” Ten rolled his eyes. “-you know what, maybe we should all just build little huts out here and deadass abandon Western civilization altogether, I mean, who the fuck needs wifi and indoor plumbing anyways—

 

Meanwhile, as the rest of them jabbered back and forth at each other, Winwin, Yuta and Taeil sat in a small triangle, making bracelets and (hopefully, eventually) full scarves from the corn threads they were braiding. Now all they needed to do was find a place with some wifi and then they could set up a whole Etsy shop —they had to find a way to make money _somehow_ if they were never going back to NCT again.

 

(Winwin hoped Yuta was at least half-joking when he said he could find love but not money since that shit was ridiculous —if Yuta ever did become a hobo it’d probably just be a matter of minutes before he got scouted by some Korean company all over again and joined some other version of NCT... That or he could become a model. Or a professional soccer player who was also a model. Yeah, Ronaldo who?)

 

Then suddenly they all quiet down and Mark turns his head, squinting at something glowing in the distance.

 

“Yooooooooo —what the fuck is _that—_

 

“I think issa, issa…” Taeyong hesitates in English, side-eyeing Mark for swearing. “-issa tra —a tractor? Does tractors have lights in the fr—

 

“-Damn, whatever the fuck it is — _it’s heading straight for us, Tae—_

 

“- _Wait, wait, wait —_ they’re coming to rescue us —look at the hair, _look at the hair—_ !” Haechan pointed, jumping up and down. “- _it’s gotta be either Jesus or Michael Jackson or Post Malone—_

 

At this point, the crashing and thundering of the vehicle got so loud they had to scream.

 

“ _JOHNNY_ , _MANNNN, HOLY SHIT —WHO KNEW JESUS DROVE A TRACTOR IN THIS BI—_

 

_“-IT’S NOT JESUS, MARK— IT’S, IT’S KUN!! YO, YO, SWEET MOTHER OF JIZZLE WIZZLE FIZZLE MA NIZZLE DRIZZLE PWARK, IT’S ACTUALLY KUN—!!!!!!”_

 

_“AW, SHIT, KUN IS MY JESUS, HOMIE— I THINK I FOUND A NEW RELIGION—_

 

_“SAME, MARK, SAMEEEE.”_

 

The tractor (van) grinds to a halt just a couple feet away and Kun throws open the doors and they all scramble inside, not even slamming them back shut as he cruises over to pick up Doyoung and Shawn in the corner. Everyone is tired and sweaty and pretty soon the whole car smells like a wet barn, but that doesn’t diminish the relief when one after the other, they look around and see Lucas is in the van too.

 

“Yo, how’d you get back, man?” Mark nudges him, leaning his head on his shoulder, feeling some of the stress wash off. “-how long were you in here, haha.”

 

“It’s a long, long story, Markeu.” Lucas shook his head. “-with, like, lots of upside down trees and stuff —but you guys look tired, I’ll save it for tomorrow.”

 

“Hey, guys, I’m kinda hungry.” Winwin piped up. “-we got any food in here?”

 

And the whole van turns into chaos again after Kun throws back two backpacks and everyone’s tearing open plastic packages and dozens of containers filled with every kind of convenience store goodie imaginable.

 

**day two 1:38 am**

 

Ten shoots up from a nightmare just as Mark rips out a fart.

 

He blinks, grimacing, telling himself that maybe somehow the nightmare wasn’t over. It’s too hot in here, though, and the stench doesn’t dissipate at all, as he realizes sometimes reality really sucked some serious ass.

 

Reaches an arm over five squished sleeping people and presses the button to roll down the window.

 

Cool air flows in. So do about thirteen mosquitoes.

 

Ten smothers his face in his hands as he tries to go back to sleep again. He sighs. _Fuck._

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bruh, ever since kun wore that majestic crown of sticks with his name in that nct yearbook thing, he always been ma jesus, trust
> 
> also can y’all tell that i miss ten and would lowkey watch him read a grocery list if that meant sm giving me an update on how he’s doing. 
> 
> (lmaooo perhaps they reach the campsite next chapter...)


	4. day two: 6:13 am

 

Johnny shifts, woken by an odd rustling from behind. He cricks his neck to the side (he’d slept sitting up, like most of them did) and turns —to the jarring sight of Mark groaning, hand inside his pants—

 

“ _Dude, what the_ _f—_

 

“It’s _not_ what it _looks_ like…” He rolled his eyes, grimacing. “- _shit_ , I think I got a mosquito bite on my _di_ —

 

Johnny nearly chokes on his spit.

 

“Bro, _how_ did that even—

 

“-Fucked if I know.” He snapped, still scratching. “-yo, hand me that Polysporin shit—

 

“-That’s for _infections_ from open wounds, idiot—

 

“-Yo, Imma open up a wound for real if I keep scratching it, man.” Gestures with his chin. “-there’s one for insect bites and shit —that has hydrocortiso—

 

“-Hydro _what_ —” Johnny leans over and dug around the backpack, retrieving a small rectangular box, squinting at the label. “-hydrocortisone...yo, isn't this thing a _steroid_ —

 

“ _So_ —?” Grabbing at the tube, but Johnny yanks it out of his reach. Whisper-screaming as loud as he could. “-hey, _gimme_ that shit bro, _what the_ _hell—_

 

“-I’m _protecting_ you, bro—

 

“-Friggin’ box says _#1 Dermatologist Approved —you think they gonna approve shit that’ll give me hepatitis—_

 

“- _Yooooooooo_ —what if you sprout a _whole bicep on your di—_

 

“-Bitch, _wh_ —

 

“- _What if a whole bodybuilder sprouts on your dick_ —

 

Taeyong stirs and blinks, noticing Mark’s hand (still) inside his pants and sighs, turning his head away. Mutters. “-could you maybe do that stuff outside or something, Mark…?”

 

“It’s _not_ what it _looks_ like…!” He groaned, so done with all of them. “- _hand me the frickin’ Polysporin, Johnny—_

  


**2:37 pm**

 

They get back on the road at 1 pm. Ten demands shotgun so he can feed Johnny snacks. Kun reluctantly agrees, telling him not to try any funny business while the guy drove — _If we end up in another cornfield again, post-mortem, I swear to God._ Ten waved him off, but Kun was somehow solemnly sure the guy was up to no good.

 

Soon everyone else in the van is asleep again and Ten gets an idea. Digs in his backpack for an unlabelled CD, grins, putting it in below the dashboard. When the beat hits, Johnny blinks, glancing at him. _Baby, hold up, oh. Turn it around for me._

 

“Woah, _this_ song?”

 

“Remember it?” Still grinning.

 

“Um, yeah, obviously _…_ ”

 

“Hehe —me too.”

 

Grinding shoulders, lip-syncing when the chorus drops:

 

_Tell me_

_What’s your favourite game_

_I (wanna play hide and freak)_

_You ain’t gotta cover up your eyes_

_(Baby, come play with me)_

 

Johnny looks over, gawking at Ten’s hips —basically doing the whole choreo sitting down. “Yo, yo, yo, _hey, hey, hey_ — _don’t break the seatbelt—_

 

Ten snorts, sliding his arms over Johnny’s shoulders, ignoring him. “- _know you wanna play wit’ it. Spend a couple days in it.”_

 

“Oh, my god—

 

“ _Hope you been stretchin', I give you this blessin'—_

 

_“T—_

 

_“We touchin’ and lovin’—_

 

_“YO—_

 

_“-You bustin’ if Ten in it~_

 

 _“AGHH._ Ten. _STOP_. I’m. Gonna. CRASH. Into. A.  _Truck_. _”_

 

The other just smirks. “-oh, am I distracting you~?”

 

“Oh, I dunno, Ten-hyung — _three quarters of your ass is on Johnny’s lap, whaddaya th—_

 

 _“Shut up, Haechan.”_ Doesn’t even turn around. “- _dammit_ , now you ruined the…”   

 

Decides to turn around anyways, deeply unimpressed when he sees Doyoung and Shawn delightfully (and uninterruptedly) getting turnt to the song (you know, with Doyoung’s tongue being out and all). Why did Haechan always have to specifically poop _his_ party, huh? _Why was life so unf—_

 

“Aw, hyung, _ain’t no crying in the club, hey, hey_ —

 

“ _Bi—_

 

_“~let the beat carry away, your tears as they fall b—_

 

“-Hey, I know this song!” Jaehyun piped up in the back (Ten had put in _Hide and Freak 10 hours_ and obviously it was still playing…). “- _hi-hide and freak —play, play, play—_

 

Taeyong looks aghast at where Jaehyun’s hand was. “- _wh_ — Jae, _do you need to pee or something—_

 

“ _It’s a dance move, hyungggg...”_

 

**3:13 pm**

 

Mark steps out of the van, taking in the scenery around him. Trees filled the edges of his vision, the gravel road winding out into the scattered woods beyond. He hears birds somewhere above, curious rustling in the leaves. Maybe deer, squirrels. Watches dust balloon behind the vehicles rolling by.

 

He sighs, stuffing his hands in his jacket pockets. Leans against the van door.

 

Lucas gets out, turns to face him, smiling too. “-hm? What’s up?”

 

“Nothing.” He shook his head, chuckling. “-just feels good to be back. You know?”

 

The other looks like he wants to say something, then stops himself, decides to just enjoy the moment. Exhales after a while. “-beautiful, huh?”

 

A couple of irritated mutters and grimaces later, Jungwoo stumbles out of the van (without stepping on too many people’s feet). Lucas catches his arm before he lands in a faceful of mud, laughing, dusting the cookie crumbs out of his hair.

 

Jungwoo lingers by him, chin planted on the guy’s shoulder. Gestures to the park store a dozen meters away. “-come on Lucas, let’s go —I wanna get some ice cream…” Glances up at him. “-you brought money, right...?”

 

“Of _course_ , hyung…” He rolled his eyes jokingly. “-but like, park store ice cream sucks apparently —Markeu told me —it’s overpriced and the flavours suck —we gotta find a Baskin Robbins or something…”

 

“You think they have that here?” Jungwoo frowned. “-last Baskin Robbins _I_ saw was at the airport, if I’m being honest…”

 

The other sighs —it’s a good thing his hyung was cute because sometimes...

 

“Hyung, I’m gonna buy you the best ice cream there is, just be patient okay?” Lucas lightly pinches his cheek as the other pouted.

 

“...can we go check the store anyway, though…?”

 

“Okay, okay, fine, haha.” Hooking an arm around his hyung’s shoulder, shaking his head.

 

Mark watches them head off in the direction of the store, their steps almost perfectly aligned. At some point, Jungwoo shifts his arm, sticking his hand in Lucas’s backpocket. The guy turns, raising his eyebrows. Gets nothing but a cheeky stuck-out tongue in reply. Grins, then copies him a moment later.

 

When they’re three quarters there, Lucas turns around, hollering. “-hey, Mark! You come too! Maybe help me convince hyung not to get the ice cream if it sucks?”

 

Mark snorts, jogging over. Lucas pushes him gently with his shoulder, gesturing at his arm with his chin. “-what?” The other guy rolls his eyes. “-come on, Mark, you _know_ what. Hand,”

 

Thinks about it, then just links arms with him. It’s good enough for now, he decides. Lucas exhales, amused. “-so Mark is shy, huh? Cute.”

 

“-it’s okay, Mark,” Jungwoo turns to him, shrugs softly. “-I don’t mind sharing.”

 

He blinks, staring at them.

 

“Sharing?” Mark shakes his head. “-no, no, hyung it’s fine —I can get my own ice cream.”

 

The other two looked at each other. For a smart kid, Mark sure was pretty dense sometimes.

  


**3:21 pm**

 

“Come on, come on —it’s over here!”

 

“Okay, okay —coming!” Doyoung laughs, letting himself get dragged into the spotty woods.

 

Sunlight dappled the carpet of leaves beneath their feet, Doyoung having to duck every minute or so to avoid smacking his head against a low branch. Shawn runs like he’s been here since forever, guiding him away from the shaky rocks, sharp dips in the path, mud bogs.

 

 _He really is cute —_ Doyoung thinks, with his red, slightly oversized flannel flying behind him, navy skinny jean legs hauling his Northface boots across the trail. Curly hair bouncing, getting into his eyes whenever he looks back. _So you've never been geocaching before? —Geoca…what...?_

 

Shawn had laughed, opening the app on his phone. _So it's like a worldwide treasure hunt, right? People hide these boxes or little things everywhere and we get to look for them. See, look —there’s one 2.3 km away from here._

 

Doyoung had squinted at the text on the screen. _Are we allowed to take…?_ Shawn made a sort-of gesture with his hand. _If it's really small, probably no. But like, if it's a whole box of stuff, you can take a little, but then you gotta put something back. —Oh, so like, exchange…? —Yeah, yeah, exactly, haha._

 

When the other feels like his lungs’ll probably give out, Shawn stops, finally, still holding Doyoung’s hand. Looks around for something in the trees.

 

“Hey. What’s wrong?”

 

Shawn turns to him. “-it’s gotta be here —I found it last year, right around this spot —maybe it’s around some tree…”

 

From the corner of his eye, Doyoung sees something flash in the distance. Without turning his head, he watches a small speck of white swoop closer until it landed on a branch some meters away. A few fluffy dots peaked out of the burrow before the silent bird hopped in.

 

Shawn faced the other direction the whole time, hands on his hips, sighing. “-maybe I got the place wrong…Shoot, guess I dragged you all the way here for nothi—

 

He turns to see Doyoung has gone over to a nearby tree, motioning for him to come on. When he’s there, Doyoung’s about to tell him to look up —but Shawn's already stuck his hand inside the burrow _—_ shouting when a giant white feathery head pops out _—_ angrily hooting, clicking and screeching for him to piss the hell off. Moments later, three smaller, friendlier heads pop out, blinking their large, yellow eyes at them curiously.

 

“Shit…” Shawn shakily examined his victimized hand, other one clutching tight on Doyoung's jacket sleeve (he'd nearly leaped into the guy's arms seconds earlier). “-okay, good, I don't think it bit me…”

 

The other snorts, looking at him, amused. “-your treasure _alive_ this time, huh?”

 

“Yeah, uh huh,” Shawn smirks, shaking his head, gesturing at the burrow. “-yeah, no _—_ I think it's under them _—_ silly owls probably pooped all over it…”

 

“It’s okay,” Doyoung shrugs, grinning. “-seeing you scared was very funny…”

 

Gets nudged in the ribs, laughing. “-okay, now _you_ got your surprise _—_ so where’s mine _—_

 

“- _tsk_ , right here.” Tugs his face down by the collar of his shirt. Smirks when he hears a couple hoots of disgust.

 

“-maybe we should…?”

 

The other guy shook his head, brushing off some pine needles in Doyoung's hair, thick roots of the tree digging into their bums.  

 

“Nah,” Shawn grins, snorting. Leans his face against his throat. “-let the dumb owl watch us make out for another ten minutes, he deserves it.”

 

**7:43 pm**

 

“Oi, guys   _—_ look, they're finally back!”

 

Mark, Johnny and Taeyong glance over _—_ recognizing the figures of Shawn and Doyoung approaching them, dimly lit by the firelight. Haechan unpauses Temple Run, one hand swiping away on his phone, other hand grabbing a drumstick, munching away.

 

Jungwoo jogs over, handing them each a kebab _—_ smells incredible, stacked with alternating glazed meatballs and colourful vegetables. Jaehyun hands them paper plates _—_ already half-filled with seafood fried rice, Korean barbequed beef and red Thai curry glazed over shrimp and onions.

 

“Taeyong's almost done with the teriyaki ribs over there.” He gestures with chin. “-we got extra chairs _—_ sit by the fire, it's starting to get a little chilly around here, haha.”

 

“-Hey, you guys should…”

 

Nods at Doyoung, gently pushing for them to go over. “-yeah, yeah _—_ me and Jungwoo'll be there in two minutes _—_ we’re helping Kun pack up the leftovers.”

 

“So how's the curry shrimp?” Ten grins, after they've gotten seated, legs draped over Johnny's lap. “-I got the recipe from my mom _—_ she makes, like, the _best_ Thai food ever.”

 

“Oh, man…” Haechan mumbles, shoving rice and shrimp in his mouth. “-can your mom switch in NCT instead?”

 

Ten makes a yucky face at him, Johnny snorts, smoothing the guy's knee in half-sympathy.

 

Jaehyun goes over to the fire, Lucas pulls Jungwoo into his lap when he finds out there's no more extra seats. Laughs when the guy starts digging in his backpack for more marshmallows at the foot of the chair.

 

“Yo, yo, yo, guys!” Lucas hollers, clapping his hands above his head. “-listen up!”

 

A mixture of begrudging sighs and laughter follows, as they all turn to the guy in question. Ten plugs his ears, Kun gently smacking his shoulder with tongs, moving over to help Taeyong pile the ribs into a large aluminum tray for everyone.

 

“Okay, okay, what is it, Lucas?” Winwin demanded jokingly in Mandarin, trying to worm both his arms out of Yuta and Taeil's linked ones.

 

(Earlier he'd complained about being unable to roast marshmallows and they'd went into the nearby trees to find sticks branching into several twigs at the end _—_ now both of them used their free hands to roast the stuff for Winwin, five at a time)

 

“Okay, guys _—_ it’s time for…” Lucas snatched a flashlight from Johnny, flicks it on under his chin. Waving his free arm spookily.  “-ghoooosssssst _storieeeeeeeeessssss_ … _wooooooooooooo_...!”

 

The circle around the fire cheered (and groaned), Taeyong facepalming at Lucas's terrible reenactment of the Fish Man.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (lol so apparently smrookies had done a choreo to hide and freak by somo and i saw it last week and lets just say it was kinda life-changing lmaoooo *cries*)
> 
> also, geocaching is a real thing, it's super popular here in canada i think. it's super cool but like download the app if u wanna look for geocaches with ur friends bc sometimes they're super hard to find (we didn't have the app at the time and my friend and i couldn't find the thing even though we were apparently within a tragic 3m radius lmaoooo


	5. day two: 11:52 pm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> reworded the endnote to explain things better

“So he turns around...sees the woman right behind him and she says…”

 

The whole circle grows quiet, hanging onto Shawn's every word.

 

“Hello, Michael.”

 

Silence.

 

Haechan blinks, sputtering. “- _wh—_ that's it _—_ ?! That's _no scary at all—_

 

“Yeah, what the heck, man!” Mark complains. “-it's, it's just a _fat lady in an_ _elevator…_!”

 

“Uh, hey, hey, the fat lady's a _ghost_ , okay,” Shawn rolls his eyes, trying not to burst out laughing. “-she’s gonna, like, hypnotize Michael and take him to _—_

 

“The _eleventh dimension_ , yeah?”

 

Shawn turns to Doyoung, making a face. “-wow, hey, thanks for the support, babe,”

 

“Yeah, yeah, Shawn Mendes, saranghae to you too,” He shot back, sending him a couple hearts. Gets elbowed in the ribs, laughing, smacking his arms away from him.

 

“Oh, _save it for bedroom_ , you idiots...” Haechan groaned, pretending to faint from disgust. “-you guys are like, no jams, I'm going to bathroom…”

 

“Hey, hey _—_ we’re coming too!” Ten stood up, dragging Johnny to his feet. “-I’m all sweaty and gross _—_ let’s take a shower together, Johnnyyyy, come on…”

 

Johnny rolled his eyes. “-bae.”

 

“...what.”

 

“It's like 12 am in the night. Place is like, _deserted._ ”

 

“Yeah, so we don’t gotta wait for open stalls, boo.” He scoffed, already yanking him along to the van. “-come on, get a towel and some shampoo, I'll go grab our slippers.”

 

Halfway there, Ten rushes back, leaping on one foot. “-yo, Taetae, lemme borrow your flipflops, mine snapped _—_

 

“Babe, you're _so_ extra sometimes,” Johnny rolled his eyes when they're heading off again, dawdling behind Hyuck.

 

“Anything to annoy the shit outta Full Sun,” He shrugged. Hyuck turns around, pretending to ugly cry, Ten sticks out his tongue.

 

When they get to the comfort center, Haechan takes a sharp left to the men's while the other two go off to the shower wing.

 

“This one looks okay.” Johnny swung open the first door. Ten gags, wrinkling his nose. “-ew, there's like, six bloody tampons in the wastebasket.”

 

“Uh, periods are a thing _—_

 

“Yeah, and so are STDs _—_

 

“ _Hello_ , you can't get AIDS from _breathing in menstrual air—_

 

“But, like, can we bathe in better accommodations.”

 

Pulls open the next, slamming it immediately. “- _fuck_ , someone took a shit right by the drain!”

 

“Aww, _gross_ …!”

 

Just shuffles over to the last door, sighing when he's graced with a clean ass room. Johnny goes over, checking everything. “-all good?”

 

Ten peels off his shirt, switching on the shower head. Stuck his hand under spray. Scoffs. “-son of a bitch _—there’s no hot water_ …”

 

They end up going to the third last stall, which thankfully, had hot water, no poop and no tampons.

 

“This is like, the most unsexiest midnight shower I've ever had…” Ten moodily foot-scoots the wet dirt along the floor, into the drain.

 

“Well, things could be worse,” Johnny offered, head under the spray, foamy clumps sliding off his hair. “-I went to a camping place once where you had to insert two bucks for every ten minutes of shower water…”

 

“ _Pfft_. Shit. Sponsored by Donald Trump or what?” Ten smirked, scrubbing at his arms. Shitty stall aside, it did afford him a fantastic view of Johnny's back.

 

The other laughs. “-it was before he became president. But yeah, maybe.”

 

He lets Ten get a turn under the shower. Adds. “-and it was hella weird too, like, cats _everywhere_.”

 

Ten snorts, almost chokes on the water running down his face. Johnny squints, picking dry shampoo bits off his hair. “-what?”

 

“Imagine a cat deadass poppin’ outta the toilet when you taking a _sh—_

 

Shoves him off from under the shower head, Ten laughing as his back hits the tiled wall, slippers squeaking as they try to find a more comfortable spot in the tiny room.

 

**...**

 

**day three 12:14 am**

 

“Okay, so maybe the ghost story wasn't _that_ scary…”

 

Doyoung turns to Shawn, both heading towards the comfort station too, shadows freakishly elongated from the flashlight he points a few meters ahead.

 

Moves closer to him, whispering in his ear. “-Jaehyun was _snoring—_

 

Gets pushed off the road, laughing, then dragged back after Shawn realizes he can't see shit without the flashlight. “-literally, okay, I _suck_ at telling ghost stories so like, it's not my fault I…”

 

Trails off, stopping, staring into the trees to their left. Shakes Doyoung's shoulder lightly, motioning for him to aim the beam in that direction.

 

“W-what's going on _—_

 

“Yo, _I_ _swear_ _to god_ , I saw something moving in the _—_ ” Shawn's pupils narrowed, spotting it again. “-okay, point the light there, I'm gonna check it out. You stay here.”

 

The guy disappeared into the trees, Doyoung frowning, having seen jackshit nothing. Moments later, the leaves swish furiously, Shawn scrambling out, gripping his shoulders. “- _Doyoung, Doyoung, Doyoung_ _—_ w-we gotta get outta here _—there’s a crazy lady in the woods —_ she’s wearing a long white robe and she's wearing a…”

 

His voice fades out as Doyoung looks beyond his shoulder, watching a dim, wavy figure emerging from the trees. Lower half of her face obscured by a surgical mask, long black hair swaying down her back. Moves towards them until Doyoung can hear the sound of her breathing.

 

“ _Do you think I'm pretty?”_

 

“Y-y-yes, yes, yes, I th-think you're pretty…” Shawn stammers, covering most of his face with his hands. Fingers start shaking violently as she hooks her own behind her mask, peeling it off.

 

_“Do you think I'm pretty?”_

 

“Y-yes, yes, I, I still think you're p-p-pretty…!” Shawn stares mortified at the deep red slash running from one end of her jaw to the other.

 

_“You can be pretty too.”_  Takes out a knife, almost gets to his face before Doyoung smacks her hand away, shoving her backwards.

 

He hears familiar laughter coming from the woods and when he looks at the woman again, her hair has fallen off _—_ it’s a _wig —_ and Jungwoo's laughing and clapping hysterically as he wipes the lipstick off his cheeks. Lucas and Mark stumble out of the woods with Haechan, Ten and Johnny, gasping and jabbering nonsense, on cloud fucking nine.

 

“That was _so good —_ Jungwoo you're a frickin’ genius…!” Mark sputters, draping a jacket over his shoulders, it's getting really chilly now. “-oh, man —Shawn nearly _pissed_ his pants, holy _shit…_ ”

 

Doyoung tries his best to comfort Shawn, massaging his shoulders in weary sympathy.

 

“The knife wasn't even _r—_ ” Johnny wiped tears from his eyes. “- _it was a reusable plastic one th_ —

 

**...**

 

**day three 1:58 am**

 

“What?”

 

Jaehyun turns to Taeyong who’s snorting at something on his phone, lying on his stomach over his sleeping bag in their tent, facing away from him. He waves for Jae to come closer, showing him the screen. “-hey, look _—_ Jungwoo dressed up as the knife lady and scared Shawn so bad when he and Doyoung were going to the bathroom. Oh my god, look at the pictures, it’s frickin’ _hilarious_ …”

 

The other peers over at the images, grinning, laughing a little. Eyes lingering on the photograph a little longer than he wants to. “-wow, you know, smudged lipstick aside, Jungwoo looks really pretty, in the, uh…”

 

“Yeah, he does.” Taeyong nodded. Turns to him again. “-you know, I’m just wondering, you know, since you guys dressed up as Jack and Rose last year, did anything…?”

 

Jaehyun looked at him, humor gone. Shook his head. “Tae, seriously, it was just for fun. You know, the usual Halloween fooling around stuff.” 

 

“Fooling around stuff? Like what kind of stuff?”

 

“Like we just ran around pretending we were...you know…”

 

“Okay, so how far did the pretending—

 

“-Well, I mean, Jungwoo sort of drank a lot so then he—

 

“-No, seriously, don’t worry it about it, Jae —you know how I suck at drinking so who knows, maybe I had one too many shots and then wound up in the same bed as Lucas—

 

“Wait, _what_ —

 

“-Yeah, seriously, you’re not the only one who gets up to freaky shit on Satan’s Fourth of July—

 

“-So you _slept_ with _Lucas_ because you _thought_ I was _banging Jungwoo_ —

 

“Well, _did you_ —

 

“ _No_. We made out a few times but like, that was it.”

 

“That was it. Really.”

 

“What, you don’t _believe_ me…?”

 

“Jungwoo is pretty and you’re attractive.”

 

“ _So are you_ —there’s a goddamn image floating around online asking what someone would buy with $200 and they labelled you $200 while they made Jungwoo $100—

 

“- _Wh_ —

 

“Then they labelled Mark $150 and Yuta $75—

 

“-That is fucked up. That is really fucked up.”

 

“I _know_ , and they even—

 

“-Wait, Jae, _how did you end up even finding a picture like that_ —

 

“-I was literally just searching up pictures that we took together as a group and then it popped up under the Related tag. Look, it’s not important, or maybe it is, I don’t know, but like, I didn’t sleep with him, okay, hyung?”

 

Taeyong sighed, shifting to lie down on his back. “-okay, Jae, fine. I believe you. And also, I didn’t sleep with Lucas. I think maybe we made out a couple times too but it wasn’t anything serious. Just Halloween stuff, right?”

 

“Yeah.” He nodded. “-just Halloween stuff.”

 

The other guy picks off cotton balls from the collar of Jae’s shirt. Pulls him down alongside him. “-you know, it’s okay to like other people. It’s not against the law or something.”

 

“I just thought Jungwoo was pretty.”

 

“And then you made out with him. Gotcha.”

 

“You still made out with Lucas.” Then Jaehyun adds, squinting. “-isn’t he dating Jungwoo? Or did he get with Mark, honestly —I’m losing track of the number of couples going on in our group…”

 

“You know, actually, I’m not sure.” Taeyong remarked, frowning. “-I think maybe Lucas wasn’t really dating either of them even though he probably slept with both and now they’re all trying to date each other…?”

 

“And you’re guessing this because…”

 

“They were sharing an ice cream.”

 

Jaehyun blew a raspberry right in his face. “- _sharing an ice cream_. Jeez, Tae, I share ice cream with literally _everybody_ —does that mean I’m _sl_ —

 

“No, Jae, I’m serious.” Taeyong snorted, slapping him lightly on the elbow. “-they were really going at that ice cream like, sh—

 

“ _Pfft._ And what does that make _you,_ huh? Really freaky ice cream voyeur, _that’s what_ —

 

“Okay, Jaehyun, do you _really_ want me to bring up that _queso_ business—

 

“ _Hyung, it was one time_ —

 

“-Just imagine _that_ on the Korean news — _Jung Jaehyun leaves Lee Taeyong for a bowl of cheese_ —

 

Tackles him down on the bed before he can say any more, laughing relieved when Taeyong pulls him down with him.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah guys, there's a legit camping park where it costs toonies for showers, yo. also filled with cats. it was a privately owned park, so yeah, just stay away from those and stick to publicly owned ones lol
> 
> btw, jaewoo is beautiful and i ship it, last third of the chapter just turned out that way bc at this point squeezing in jaewoo is gonna be way too much for me to handle lmaooo
> 
> also, the character jungwoo dressed as is based on a korean folk tale that warns kids not to go out in the streets at night because there's a lady with a surgical mask who will ask you if you think she's pretty two times (she'll kill you if you say no) and if you say yes both times, she'll cut your face to match hers lol. freaky shit.
> 
> On a more serious note, I want to say that self-worth is an issue that many people struggle with. It's also likely that many Korean idols struggle with this on a daily basis considering the nature of their careers. Assigning a random monetary value to members in a Korean idol group (or even to anyone in general) does not benefit either the fans or the artists. It perpetuates the idea that this type of behaviour is okay. For the artists, especially for the one who got assigned the lowest monetary value, it is incredibly hurtful and disrespectful to the amount of years (and effort) they've worked to get as far as they have. At this point, I'll say the image mentioned in the last third of this chapter does exist unfortunately. But the issue is not whether or not it exists but why it was even conceived in the first place. Perhaps certain companies encourage these types of ideas because they don't care as long as they make a profit. But as fans (who are not bound by the companies to have a certain mindset), and as human beings in general, we should not be perpetuating these types of ideas.
> 
> sorry that the mood took a whole 180 turn, the next chapter will be a lot lighter.


	6. day three: 7:13 am

Lucas wakes up, throat feeling like a burnt sock. Shimmies outta the sleeping bag, rummaging in their clothing bag, mumbling _water, water, water, water._ Finds nothing, groans loudly, unzipping the front of the tent and stumbles out. Winces from the bright sky.

 

Tucks his arms tightly over his chest, thin t-shirt not keeping him from the early morning cold at all. Staggers over to the cooler on the picnic table, flips it open, digging for water. It’s all frozen though —when he unscrews the cap of one and turns it upside down, not even three measly drops make their way onto his tongue. Tosses the bottle back in, frustrated.

 

Stomps over to Johnny’s tent and starts smacking at the front to wake them up. There’s no need to though —Lucas thinks he hears some shuffling and muttering and grimacing inside — _mother of god, the fuck’s that idiot up this early for..._ When Johnny unzips the front flap, hair all messed up, Lucas blurts apologetically.

 

“Uh, s-sorry, hyung —did I interrupt somethi—

 

“Yeah, you _di_ —

 

“Nope, you didn’t!” Johnny called over Ten, laughing somewhat uneasily. “-what’s up, Lucas?”

 

“-uh, do you have any wa—

 

Someone (Ten) hurls a half empty bottle at his feet. “-now get lost —I’m in the middle of making Johnny f—

 

Picks up the bottle, unscrews the cap. Nearly spits it all out after he gulped some down.

 

“Aw, shit, man —how _old_ is this thing—

 

“-Uh, maybe, like…” The other yawns, picking stray eyelashes out of his cornea. Rummages his backpack for some food. “-three days in the car…? What, does it taste funny?”

 

“Yeah, man, like _Mark’s fart—_

 

Johnny nearly chokes on his banana. Someone mutters (rather loudly). “-well, then. _Somebody’s_ mouth’s been places…”

 

“What?”

 

“You should really tie your shoelaces.” Johnny mumbled. Crashes back onto bed, drags a corner of the sleeping bag over his ass.

 

Lucas looks down in befuddlement. He wasn’t even wearing socks.

  


**7:22 am**

 

“Woah, Lucas —up already?”

 

Kun emerges from the trees behind their tents, still in pajamas, holding two tin bowls of vegetables, returning from the public tap. Sets both bowls on the picnic table, pulls out the chopping board from the cooler and gets the knives ready. Hands Lucas four potatoes and a small blade.

 

“You know how to peel 'em?”

 

Lucas blinks some crusts out of his eyes. For a second he doesn't even recognize the things in his hands as potatoes and thought Kun was asking him to peel rocks for breakfast.

 

Blinks again, yawning, still staring blankly at the irregular spuds.

 

“Uh…”

 

“Do you or do you not?” Kun lowkey began to feel like Yoda.

 

“Uh, um...no…”

 

The other guy rolls his eyes, replaced the potatoes with tomatoes. “-what about those.”

 

“Uh…”

 

“Okay, can you peel onions? Carrots? Zucchini?”

 

“Well, uh…”

 

“Artichokes? Squash? Rutabagas?”

 

Lucas’s eyes swelled to the size of rutabagas. Kun rushed over before he dropped the poor tomatoes on the ground. “- _wh_ —rutawh— yo, is that a _Pokémon..._? Is it related to Bulbasaur _...?_ ”

 

Kun looked at him, patience shrinking to the size of a Brussels sprout. “-okay, what _do_ you know how to peel, Lucas…?”

 

He blinks, staring at his now empty hands.

 

“Uh, um, uh, bananas...?” Quickly adds, when Kun looks at him in utter disappointment. “-oh, and, uh, uh, condoms too…!”

 

“Well,” Kun set the knife on the cutting board sighing. “-since _we can’t put either of those things_ in our breakfast ramen, here.” Hands him back the tin bowls, replaced with different items. “-go wash those and chop them up later for salad.”

 

“Kun, there’s raw chicken breasts in one bowl and a pile of Klondike bars in the other…”

 

“Lucas — _I stayed up until 4 am last night because Jaehyun wouldn’t stop texting me about every little thing about Taeyong—_

 

“Kun-ge—

 

“- _Their tent is so small apparently Taeyong rolled over in his sleep and squashed Jaehyun across the left wall. He texted me at 3:40 am about how to politely roll a man off of you without waking them up.”_

 

“-So what did you—

 

“I unzipped the flap and dragged him out of the tent —Taeyong was lying diagonally so there was no way to move him. I told Jae to go back inside but then Taeyong farted and Jaehyun wanted to sleep in the car but he told me not to tell Taeyong anything when he woke up.”

 

“So then did you finally get sl—

 

“ _No —Jaehyun texted me again at 4:02 am because apparently he got bitten by a bunch of mosquitoes and now his abs look like those rainbow brownies —you know the ones with the sprinkles —he even decided to send me pictures and it blew up on the group chat so I literally had to throw my phone inside the car with him—_

 

“Okay, okay, I’m just gonna—

 

“-Just drag the whole cooler to the public tap and wash all the vegetables, Lucas, I’ll bring you the bowls later…”

  


**1:17 pm**

 

“Okay, guys.” Taeyong holds up the map, eyes following the road. “-so the trail we’re going on is actually not in this park —we gotta drive about 10 kilometers further south —there’ll be a sign and everything, we can’t miss it—

 

“-Wait, what’s the trail called?” The rest of them stand around him in a sort of half-circle beside their van in the main parking lot. Mark checks to make sure he packed extra sunscreen and sandwiches, looking up again. “-you know, so we’ll know if it’s the right sign or not…”

 

“You mean like, the name?” Tae looks at it, somewhat unimpressed, continues in English. “-the, uh, The Crack?

 

Mark snorted. “-wait, _what_ crack?”

 

Lucas nudges him, winking. “-buttcrack.”

 

It takes Mark about ten seconds to get it, then his fist’s over his mouth, jumping up and down.

 

“ _Buttcrack, buttcrack, buttcrack_ —oh, my god, Lucas, _that’s so good_ —

 

Taeyong glares at him wearily, rolling his eyes in Korean. “-it’s not a _buttcrack_ , Mark, it’s called _The Crack_ because there’s a giant rock that cracked in the middle _after hundreds of years of_ _weathering and erosio_ —

 

“- _Rock solid buttcrack, ohhhhhh—_ ” Johnny cuts in, Mark cheering, slamming him an automatic high-five. Haechan joins in, nudging Johnny eagerly on the shoulder. “-hey, hey, remember that time when Winwin got knocked onto the floor by _Jaehyun’s rock solid b_ —

 

Yuta gave him that side-eye because he _did_ remember —out of all the things he had to protect Winwin from over the years, Jaehyun’s wild booty was something he really hadn’t anticipated. The whole of NCT really was after his Winwin, this love business _was no game._

 

Anyhow, Jungwoo looked really confused at the whole thing (and Shawn probably would’ve been too if he and Doyoung weren’t several feet away, too busy making out by the trees).

 

“Wait, wait, guys, what’s going on—

 

Gets attacked by a flurry of answers that make no sense at all, making him protest. “-hey, hey, hey, all I’m hearing is something like we’re climbing a cracked rock called the Crack with a buttcrack, I’m confused —it’s the first time I’m hearing about a rock having a buttcrack — _I didn’t even know rocks had butts_ —is this a purely Canadian thing or do Korean rocks have buttcracks too—

 

“No, no, no Jungwoo.” Lucas cut in “- _the rock has a crack which is it’s own buttcrack, it’s simple science_ —”

 

Ten squints at him in disbelief.

 

“But rocks _don’t have buttcracks_ —

 

“Hey, hey, hey! _Rude_ —The Rock _has_ a _buttcrack_ —

 

“Wh— _Johnny_ —

 

“- _The Rock has a butt, he’s gotta have a buttcrack too_ —

 

“That’s not _what I’m tryna say_ , Johnny—

 

“ _Justice For The Rock’s Buttcrack 2k18_ —

 

After that, nearly all of NCT127’s on the ground rolling. Mark by his own accord, this time Jaehyun’s (thick and powerful) butt knocking down not just Winwin but also Taeil, Haechan and a (reluctant) Taeyong one by one like dominoes, before joining Mark on the pavement, gasping. Johnny’s laughing hard but not quite there, Ten’s judging him (hard) and Yuta sighs, patiently explaining to Jungwoo what’s going on.

 

Lucas pulls Mark up along with some more of them, the only thing coming out of their mouths being _buttcrack,_ chanting it like it was some kind of soccer team. Kun looks around, squinting at some child crying a few meters away, aghast when he hears what the father’s going on about in Korean.

 

“Hey, hey, hey —some poor kid’s getting yelled at because he’s saying _buttcrack_ — _we can’t be leading children wayward like this_ —

 

“ _B-b-b-b-b-buttcra_ —

 

“ _Stop. Saying. Buttcrack. Lucas.”_ Kun wailed, throwing his hands up in the air (like he just don’t care).

 

“Hey!” The father hollered at him. “- _You. Stop. Saying. Buttcrack. Why you keep saying_ —

 

“Oh, my god…” Kun dropped his face into his hands. He felt like he sold his soul to the devil.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the Crack is real, it's a bit of a drive away from Killarney Provincial Park --it's 7 km long and it's 3 km of pure pain up a sheer marble mountain basically (it's the closest i've ever gotten to rock climbing without uh, actually rock climbing). if y'all ever go, don't be stupid like us lol and try to get out of the trail going down the opposite side of the mountain, it's a lot less steeper but it'll take hours for you to get back to your car and you'll probs be still stuck in the woods by nightfall. the view is beautiful but at what price lmaoo
> 
> also, i realized the issue in the last third of the previous chapter will likely somewhat change the trajectory of the whole story and i'll deal with that when the time comes (as well as mark's canadian nostalgia haha) :)


	7. day three: 1:47 pm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ayo so i kinda disappeared for a month bc i kinda had to get my shit together for exams and whatnot lmaoo  
> also this was a whole lot funnier while i was in the shower, a month ago lol
> 
> anyhow, i'm back but the updates'll probably be super irregular (huh) now bc of school, volunteering, work etc.

“Yo man, I’m just saying,” They were about 4 minutes into The Crack now —everything pure forest, no (rock) buttcracks yet. Lucas gestured at the bushes about a dozen meters off. “-I think it’s kind of an ethical issue, I mean, if you really think about it…”

 

Yuta directs his attention at the two crouching figures in question —Doyoung and Shawn, feeling a bit, okay fine, _extremely_ jealous, upon seeing them busily popping wild blueberries into each other’s mouths, looking happy as fuck. He wanted to do the same thing with Winwin but that guy was hanging out with Ten _way_ too much now and suddenly didn’t want anything to do with fruits for the past few days…

 

Meanwhile, the rest of 127 were huddled around Kun doing some magic trick with acorns while Taeyong and Jaehyun had run off doing God knows what behind some trees.

 

“I don’t get it.” He shook his head, smacking a mosquito on the side of his neck. “-they’re just happy. Is it illegal to be happy now?”

 

“ _Nooo_ —you don’t _get_ it — _if a tree falls and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound_ —

 

“Lucas, _wh_ —” Starts furiously doing squats in an effort to confuse the dead mosquito’s extended family (attending the funeral on his left carotid). “-that makes no frickin’ sense — _are Doyoung and Shawn the trees or is it the blueberries_ —

 

“ _Obviously_ I’m talking about the—” Whips his head over to see Mark crouched down, snacking on some blueberries too now —the bush extended like a tiny, leafy fence lining the trail. “-oh my _gawd_ , Mark, man — _stop eating them_ —

 

The other kid gags, peering up at him, eyebrows almost high enough to take flight. “-aw, shit—” Mark gurgled, dark purple juice dribbling down his chin. “-are these the poisonous ones…? Damn it, maybe I mixed up the wild blueberries with the pokeweed again…”

 

“The _what_ — Mark, the _frick_ _kinda shit_ are you putting in your _mouth_ —

 

“Yo, chill, it’s just pokeweed, okay,” Rolls his eyes. “-I mean like sure, eating several pokeberries can cause vomiting, pain, nausea and occasionally bloody diarrhea, but I ate like two, I’ll be fine, bro.”

 

“Wow, Mark, first time I’ve ever heard someone be so chill about bloody diarrhea...I’m guessing you’ve never actually had it before…”

 

“And _you_ have, Yuta-hyung?”

 

“Unfortunately, yes,” He replied, wrinkling his nose at the memory. “-went to a really shady sushi place back in Osaka when I was nine…” Makes him recall that Gordon Ramsay meme he saw a while back — _This squid is so raw I can still hear it telling SpongeBob to fuck off._ Shook his head. Bad times, bad times.

 

“-Okay, guys, guys, so back to what I was saying,” Lucas turns to Mark, smacks the remaining fruit out of his hands. “-stop chugging the weed berries, Markeu, and just listen to my Powerpoint presentation for like two seconds, okay —I’m onto some deep shit, man, I can feel it.”

 

“Alright, go on.”

 

Lucas took a deep breath. Picked up one berry from the ground. Exhaled.

 

“Blueberries are living things.”

 

The other two just blinked at him.

 

“Sure…?” Yuta shrugged. “-I mean like, they can go bad and shrivel up and die so I guess the Circle of Life comes after their ass too?”

 

“Exactly.” Lucas wrung his hands. “- _And_ ,”

 

“Yes…?”

 

“Blueberries. Don’t have _voices_. Like physically. Or vocally.” Waved it off. “-ya know what I mean, okay, man...”

 

“Okay, also true…? But like Lucas, what exactly are you trying to—

 

“ _But just because blueberries don’t have voices doesn’t mean they can’t feel pain_ —

 

“-Okay, Lucas, now hold up a second—

 

“-Mark, man, shut up, look —Alien, 1979, Ridley Scott, okay?”

 

“O-Okay…?” Vaguely remembers the old sci-fi flick they watched at 3 am a couple weeks ago. “-what about it—

 

“- _When you’re in space, no one can hear you scream._ ”

 

Silence. Mark glanced over at Yuta, who’d started to do some bizarre trap dance in attempt to wring off the hornets who’d joined in on the mosquito siesta around his head.

 

“Yes, Lucas, that _was_ the 1979 movie poster, but what does _that_ have to do wi—

 

“It’s the _same thing, man_ — _why are you so dumb_ —

 

“-The _f_ —quit calling me _dumb_ and just _explain_ it, you idio—

 

“ _WHEN. YOU. ARE. A. BLUE. BER. RY.”_   He clapped at each syllable furiously to make his point. “- _NO. BO. DY. CAN. HEAR. YOU. SCREAM.”_

 

Yuta stared at him like his teeth were changing colour. He stopped slapping at the buzzing insects, just to blink at him for a while. “-okay, wait, _wh_ —

 

“-Yuta-hyung, man—

 

“-I’m _so confused_ right now —are the blueberries _aliens_ —are they secretly _humans_ but in _outer space_ —or are you implying that _blueberries can actually scream but just not in our dimension_ —

 

_What on earth is going on over there…?_ Doyoung wondered, turning his head at the yarddling yeti yapping and missing Shawn’s mouth when he tossed the blueberry. It bounces off the guy’s chin and rolled down underneath his shirt, making him jump a little as it rolls back out and hits the ground.

 

Hears a bunch of rubbish and just shrugged, going back to aiming blueberries at his boyfriend’s mouth.

 

“-No, no, no, no, no, _noooooo_ —” Lucas rolled his eyes in frustration. “-that’s overcomplicated, man, I mean it like, _shark-fin soup,_ man—

 

“The _f_ —

 

“-Every time you yank a berry off the bush it’s like you yanking fins off sharks, okay, _you are destroying the plant's body, man_ —

 

“- _Dammit_ , _blueberries are independent from the bush, Lucas_ —

 

“-And how do _you_ know, _geniu_ —

 

“Blueberries don’t _bleed_ , man—

 

“The hell was that stuff _rolling down your mouth_ two minutes ago, man —are you gonna tell me that blueberries _pee_ now? _Was that pee, bro?_ Have they ascended to the level of _liquid farts, homie_ —

 

“-Lucas, _why're you so friggin’ hyped up about this shi_ —

 

" _Brooo —_ how would  _you_ feel if somebody just _yanked you off a bush, man_ —

 

"I don't  _know_ , Yukhei — _I don't grow on bushes, goddammit—_

 

_"Well it's high time you support your bush brethren, man—_

 

"-The _f_ — I don't _got_ no _bush brethr—_

 

_"-_ _Firetruck era hair had me thinkin' otherwi—_

 

Yuta blew a fat raspberry, spit flying. "-oh, _too soon._.."

 

" _You too, Yuta-hyung—_

 

He stopped laughing, smile disappearing. "-okay, rude, what did I ever do to deser—

 

“ _-Sharks are blueberries, man_ —they go through _the same shit_ — _but_   _blueberries don’t have voices so we can’t hear them scream_ —

 

“-Really, really don’t think you’d want blueberries to scream, Lucas—

 

“-And _why_ _not_ , Yuta-hy—

 

“- _Because you literally just stepped on a bunch —_ you’d be hearing a never-ending stream of _“fuck yous”_ right now if they di—

 

“Okay, man, but—

 

“ _And I really don’t think you’d want flowers to have voices either—_

 

_"WHy n—_

 

_"-_ _Like every time a bee lands and starts humping the pollen, you really wanna hear all of tha—_

 

_"-Aw, man that's nasty —_ wait _,_ would every piece of pollen have a voice or would it sound like one collective voice saying  _stop baby don't stop —_ because that might actually be kinda ho _—_  

 

_"-_ Mark _, it doesn't matter,_ and wait _, what the f—_

 

“-Okay, yo, Lucas for real, _blueberries can’t be sharks—_

 

“ _How do you know, Markeu_ —

 

“-Because blueberries _don’t have fins_ —

 

"-This just in  _—Mark's into pollen now—_

 

“-Shush it, Yuta-hyung _—"_ Immediately whips his head back to Mark.

 

"-That don’t mean _shit_ , man — _have you seen the mola mola fish_ — _homeboy look like a constipated pizza pocket with wings_ —

 

“- _Mola mola still got fins, Lucas_ —

 

“-That’s not my _point_ —

 

“Then what _is_ your poin—

 

“- _Just because something don’t look like a fish doesn’t mean it ain’t one_ —

 

“-But blueberries _don’t have fins_ —

 

“- _Why not_ —

 

“- _Because. Blueberries. Aren’t. Fish. Dude.”_

 

Lucas stares at him, wordless for a second. Yuta thought about mentioning that sharks weren’t exactly fish either but decided against it as that wouldn’t really help anything at this point.

 

Something in Lucas’s eyes flash and then he’s about to go back in again when Taeyong bursts in through the trees, arms carrying a very sweaty, swollen and red-faced Jaehyun (of which, Yuta was unfortunate enough to notice, didn’t have his pants entirely pulled up at the back…).

 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa —the heck’s going on, man?!”

 

Taeyong rolled his eyes at Mark as the rest of the group crowded around them.

 

“Well, if you _must_ know,” He sighed. “-Jaehyun, over here, had to take a dump last night, right. So he went behind a tree, did the stuff and _then_ this genius decides to _wipe his ass with some random leaves he finds growing right next to him_ —

 

“-I didn’t _know_ if you had _toilet paper…”_ The moody reply snapped groggily back.

 

“-You dumbass, _I carry like six packs of napkins in either pocket every time I take one step into Mother Nature’s backyard barbecue_ —

 

“-Well, maybe I was tryna be more eco-friendl—

 

“-So _lo and behold_ —” Taeyong cuts him off, chin jutting out at every syllable like an angry seagull. “-turns out, the leaves were _poison ivy._ ”

 

“Hyung, it’s not even that serious— I can barely feel the—

 

“- _You can barely feel anything because your body is shutting down and going numb, David Suzuki_ —

 

“-It’s literally just my left buttcheek—

 

“- _Which has swollen to the size of a small village_ —

 

“-Stop _overexaggerating_ —

 

“- _Hell no_  —man, leaf touch the other cheek _and Kim Kardashian goes jobless_ —

 

“-Tae, _I’d go jobless too_ — _I can’t dance without my butt.”_  Jaehyun wasn’t sure if it was just the neurotoxins setting in, but now he was actually starting to panic a little. One side of his ass felt like a block of cheese and now it felt like the cheese was getting eaten by bulldozers.

 

“-Jae, shit, _I can’t even pull your pants up now because your butt got so fat_ —

 

“-Shut up, Tae, _deep down you’re still jealous because you still want what you can’t have_ —

 

“-Jaehyun what the heck are you talking about—

 

“ _Every morning when I wake up I see you grabbin’ ass_ —

 

“-Wow, Jae, you sure choose really _convenient_ times to _wake up_ —

 

“-Taeyong, hyung, hyung, you gotta stop yelling at him,” Mark cut in, somewhat wedging his face between the two.  “-look, you’re stressing him out —he’s gonna go into shock or some shit if you keep it up.”

 

“Well, then _what_ do you want me to _do_ —

 

“-You need to try to calm him do—

 

“- _Care to demonstrate_ before _I_ go into shock then—

 

“Okay, okay, hyung, I got this, I got this.” He waved it off. Leans in, awkwardly holds Jae’s face in his hands. “-okay, hyung, look —you gotta calm do—

 

“ _-Fuck you_ — _my ass is changing shape, I can feel it_ —

 

Winces at the spit flying into his face, wipes some of it off, mumbling. “-yo, TY, no lie, you gotta get him to a clinic real soon before he loses his mind —the poison ivy ain't that serious, man, it’s just a rash, but yo mans is falling apart right n—

 

“- _I can fucking hear you talking about me behind my back ironically right in my face, Mark L_ —

 

“-Ayo, Mark, my arms can’t handle it anymore—" Taeyong cuts in. "-you get his underarms, okay —yo, Johnny, hey, get over here!” Points with his chin, loosens his grip as the other two pitch in. “-you grab the back of his legs, s’long as you don’t graze his butt you’ll be fine, ‘kay.”

 

Shakes his free arms in relief —felt like they were gonna snap like wet ramen noodles. Leans his back against a tree and sits down, just staring up at the sky for a while.

 

“-Jaehyun, man, whatever you’re feeling right now, is an overreaction, okay?” Mark repeated, regaining the grip on his puffy cheeks, hooking his elbows under the guy’s arms. “-look, poison ivy isn’t that bad, okay —you’re not going to _die_ or anything, okay, worst case scenario, your butt shape will just be a little differen—

 

" _The hell's that supposed to mean—_

 

"-Like, I don't know, it'll be more angular or someth—

 

“- _Wh— like a fucking square_ —?!"

 

“- _nobody wants to be a square._ ”

 

“ _Shut up, Johnny_. _”_ Snapped three different people.

 

“-Jaehyun, man, the more you panic, the worse it’s gonna feel, okay —look, if you keep freaking out about it, you might actually die from shock. Look,” Mark dug in his pocket. “-I have some Polysporin on me, for like rashes, let me just—

 

“-What makes _you_ the goddamn professional, huh—?!” Looked him dead in the eye. “-you know what I hate the most —you acting like you know every goddamn thing around here just because you’re frickin’ Canadian —I bet you know next to nothing about Canada anyways—

 

Something in Mark broke and he nearly dumps Jae’s ass into the dirt. 

 

“-Next to _nothing_ about Canada, huh — _the fuck do you know about Canada, asshat_ —

 

“Mark—

 

“ _When did Canada become an independent country_ —

 

“Mark, please—

 

“ _When did Newfoundland officially become a province_ —

 

“Mar—

 

“ _How many tons of cheese did Canada produce in 1997_ —

 

“M—

 

“ _How much beer does the Moosehead Brewery in Saint John’s, New Brunswick produce per minute_ —

 

“Mark, the _f_ —

 

_July 1st 1867. 1949. 350,000. 1642 bottles._ Winwin muttered under his breath, though no one heard him (almost no one —Yuta winked at him proudly). He’d searched up _43 Interesting Facts About Canada_ a couple weeks before they got here —historical trivia was pretty darn fascinating. Meanwhile, Mark rode on the fear in Jaehyun’s eyes for not knowing any of the answers, and just silently stared at him triumphantly (because actually, he didn’t know any of them either…).

 

“Okay, guys, here’s the plan—” Kun cleared his throat as Taeyong pulled himself back up. “-hyung, you, Mark and Johnny get Jaehyun back to the car and drive him to the nearest clinic, which is —oh, hey," Checks his phone. "—just under eleven kilometers, five to ten minutes —the rest of us’ll just stay here and wait for you guys to come back.”

 

It’s suddenly oddly quiet and Mark looks down to see Jaehyun completely unconscious —smacks him (somewhat gently) across the face to make sure he’s not dead (earns a groggy, but still rather alarmingly accurate spit bomb on his left ear —of which he wipes off and draws a petty spit angel with on the perpetrator’s left facial cheek).

 

“You sure?” Taeyong addresses (only) Kun. “-there’s like armies of mosquitoes in here —maybe you should wait around the parking lot at the edge of the trail…”

 

“-We’ll be fine —it’s way too hot over there —just leave your backpack with food and water here and just come back as soon as you can.”

 

The other guy sighed, shrugging and dropped his arms to his sides. “-alright, if that works for you then we’ll be going. Everyone else,” He does a full survey around. “-no funny business, okay. Haechan, Lucas —I’m looking at both of you.”

 

Lucas gave him a thumbs up, Haechan rolled his eyes.

 

Waited until the four of them were about a dozen meters away, then took a breath. “-okay, guys — _time for a spitting contest—_

 

“- _Haechan, I can still hear you_ —

 

Doyoung turns his head as the four of them pass by him and yaps at Mark for what the heck’s going on. Blinks and turns back to Shawn.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Three things.” He declares, still blinking. “-sharks are blueberries. Blueberries are aliens. Jaehyun’s butt’s on fire.”

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol jae will be fine, he's just stressed. neo got his back, man. trust.
> 
> so i heard about what happened to haechan and all i want to say is that i hope they give him enough time to heal properly because what's worse than being let out of the hospital before you're fully recovered and just getting injured all over again (and possibly worsening the injury). i really hope he's not being too hard on himself right now and maybe feels at least a tiny bit better if he read some of the supportive comments i've seen on twitter. that boy deserves all the love he's gotten and more <3


End file.
